In today’s fully digital era, both information and daily news recommendations are instantly accessible in the palm of our hands. This brings significant benefits for many industries as technology enables information to be delivered quickly and easily, and in some cases even becomes more cost-effective because brands no longer need to spend as much on advertising.
However, this same speed of information also creates crisis potential for brands. This article discusses how brands can predict crises by using Social Media Monitoring.
Crises in the Digital Age Unfold in Seconds
According to the Global Digital Report 2026, internet user growth is 9x faster than global population growth—showing an accelerating global digitalization rate. Nearly 98.2% of Indonesia’s population uses mobile phones to access the internet. Information today can spread within seconds—whether accurate or not. Both misinformation and disinformation can trigger crises, not only for brands but also for individuals.
One example is the misinformation incident involving the brand Arla during its testing of Bovaer (a feed additive that reduces methane). The testing sparked negative reactions from consumers. Concern and fear over the trial led to a boycott and a decline in sales. The lack of clear information about the test results caused misinformation to spread rapidly across social and online media. Many consumers did not know that Arla’s products did not actually contain the Bovaer additive.
Lalu, bagaimana cara kita dapat memitigasi terjadi sebuah isu sebelum berlanjut menjadi krisis?
Early Warning Signs of Crisis in the Digital World
Brand or individual crises rarely happen suddenly. They often start with small conversations on one social channel and quickly spread due to lack of early response or communication mitigation. Referring to the framework SCCT (Situational Crisis Communication Theory) framework, organizations can manage crises through communication strategies aligned with the level of crisis. Every crisis begins with early warning signs, typically visible through public interactions.
Beberapa tanda awal potensi krisis yang dapat dikenali:
- Sudden spikes in mentions or comments on a specific topic
- Sharp shifts in public sentiment, especially rising negative comments
- Influential figures (influencers or major accounts) joining the conversation
- Repeated narratives or specific hashtags trending and gaining attention
The faster an organization detects these signals and takes preventive action, the smaller the reputational damage. Here, social media monitoring becomes an effective tool to help brands quickly detect patterns of a potential crisis.
Understanding Social Media Monitoring Tools for Crisis Detection and Management
When all news and information circulate on social media, opinions, posts, comments, and tweets collectively shape perceptions about brands or individuals. Without a system capable of reading large-scale data quickly, it becomes difficult to mitigate issues in time.This is where social media monitoring plays a crucial role.
Through monitoring, brands can observe, analyze, and understand what the public is discussing across all social channels. All social data is processed into a comprehensive dataset that helps brands interpret public perception easily within a single platform.
This data-driven approach helps organizations avoid impulsive decisions and instead build narratives that are accurate and empathetic toward the public.
From Detection to Response: Turning Data into Action
Detecting early crisis signs is only the first step. The real challenge lies in how communication or PR teams respond and transform data into strategic action. In communication, speed and accuracy determine how much a crisis escalates.
Once early signals appear, PR and communication teams must act quickly through three core stages:
- Issue Verification and Validation – Ensure the emerging information is accurate and not the result of manipulation or misunderstanding. This prevents miscommunication that may worsen the situation.
- Analisis konteks dan risiko – Identify who is spreading the issue, how far it has spread, and what the dominant sentiment is. This helps determine response priority.
- Message Formulation and Channel Selection – Craft clear, honest, and empathetic messaging that stays consistent across all channels—social media, press releases, and internal communication.
The role of social media monitoring continues beyond initial mitigation. Through ongoing analysis, organizations can observe shifts in public sentiment, measure the effectiveness of their response, and evaluate the impact of their actions.
In modern PR, this is known as the crisis learning process, where every issue or crisis becomes a foundation for improving communication systems and strengthening public trust.
“In other words, social media monitoring is not just a crisis-detection tool, it is a compass that guides organizations toward wiser, data-driven communication.”
The Role of Dataxet Sonar as a Social Media Monitoring Platform
Dataxet Sonar is a media intelligence company providing a social media monitoring platform known as DXT360. For detecting early potential crises, this tool provides full end-to-end support.
Dataxet Sonar helps organizations and brands understand public opinion, issue trends, and sentiment dynamics across social channels—from X, Instagram, and TikTok to traditional media such as radio and TV.
With broad data coverage and features designed for communication and PR teams, crisis detection and subsequent monitoring become significantly easier.
Key features relevant to crisis management include:
- Automatic Sentiment Analysis: Quickly identifies positive, negative, or neutral sentiment toward a brand or issue. This will help teams quickly understand how people feel about an issue without having to manually review every mention.
- Real-Time Alert System: Alerts are triggered when there is an unusual spike in conversation volume or sudden changes in sentiment. These notifications can be sent via email or WhatsApp, giving teams an early warning so they can respond before the issue escalates.
- Share of Voice & Trend Analysis: Compares brand position against competitors in public conversations. It helps to pinpoint where the issue is growing, which channels are driving it, and whether the topic is gaining momentum.
And many more features that help teams evaluate whether emerging conversations have the potential to become crises affecting brand reputation.
Conclusion: Crises Can Be Prevented When Detected Early
The potential for communication crises will never fully disappear. But they can be prevented through the right steps. With social media monitoring, brands and individuals can understand how public opinion forms, who influences conversations, and how perceptions evolve over time.
Supported by a monitoring platform like Dataxet Sonar, the crisis-handling process becomes easier, more measurable, and fully integrated within a solid analytics ecosystem.
In crisis management or crisis mitigation, speed and accuracy of response are everything.
